Problems With the Scientific Method

[Fraggle Rocker]

While I completely sympathize with the content of this post, you are far too stodgy and restrictive for a forum who's main purpose is entertainment and consists of a multinational member base with a wide variety of reasons for posting here.

I don't know... since you backed off and resumed treating this discussion as a scientific one, it has certainly blossomed. As for our main purpose being entertainment, I could not disagree more. As I have stated on the "SciForums Policy" thread, I believe our main purpose is to provide a place for people of science and people with an interest in science to gather without having to constantly beat back the Forces of Darkness. Certainly entertainment, advice, companionship and sheer foolishness are parts of that, but the essence is to host discussions of a scientific nature. Otherwise we'd be just another chat room full of trolls and horny teenagers.

Corporation needs to be taken out of science, for science to do it's job freely.

I agree with you in spirit. As a libertarian I see the corporation as having been invented by governments to fill the role of the vanishing aristocracy: to be larger than life and so entrusted with government's dirty work (corporations cannot be effectively punished, much less beheaded) and to distract our attention from the even more heinous deeds of the king and queen. Yet the very ability of the corporation to create the resource of vast quantities of surplus wealth--capital--makes it arguably the engine that made possible the progress and prosperity of the Enlightenment and the Industrial Era. The nature of wealth is changing; the most valuable resource of the Post-Industrial Era is data, which is cheap and clean to produce and difficult to hoard. The capitalism of Smith, Keynes and Friedman, and specifically the corporation, may be anachronisms.

 

[Odin'Izm]

You're still looking at nutrients as pharmacological. Chronic diseases are the cumulative result of long term abuse, whether deficiency of micronutrients, imbalance or od'ing on macronutrients.

Nutrients follow a U shaped curve in terms of effects and being of low concentration does not mean it is less damaging, the low concentrations themselves may be the primary cause of the damage!

Am not.

Low concentrations in terms of cancer are not the culprit. Excess is.

 

[S.A.M.]

Am not.

Low concentrations in terms of cancer are not the culprit. Excess is.

So antioxidant deficiency does not lead to cancer?

 

[Odin'Izm]

I agree with you in spirit. As a libertarian I see the corporation as having been invented by governments to fill the role of the vanishing aristocracy: to be larger than life and so entrusted with government's dirty work (corporations cannot be effectively punished, much less beheaded) and to distract our attention from the even more heinous deeds of the king and queen. Yet the very ability of the corporation to create the resource of vast quantities of surplus wealth--capital--makes it arguably the engine that made possible the progress

An alternative should be found which stops scientific research being abandoned in favour of profit. I agree that the corporation allowed the boom, but it's different from the corruption seen in the market today.

 

[Odin'Izm]

So antioxidant deficiency does not lead to cancer?

no. in no way.

It increases the risk, if the person subjects himself to a high protein diet maybe.

But a defficiency in anti oxidants does not on it's own lead to cancer.

The effects of anti oxidants is limited anyway, when the damage is dealt to a cell membrane it's already there. Mitigating the effects by jamming yourself full of cranberries, lowers the risk.... but if you fail to do so you won't give yourself cancer.

 

[S.A.M.]

no. in no way.

It increases the risk, if the person subjects himself to a high protein diet maybe.

But a defficiency in anti oxidants does not on it's own lead to cancer.

uh-huh, you're ignoring the role of inflammation.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=15182851&dopt=Abstract

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/e...ez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum

http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=813824

 

[Odin'Izm]

I like you, you read pub med.

While the role of anti-oxidants is important in countering damage done to cells already prone to mutation, the "risk" of mutation itself is cause by other factors, such as genetics and exposure to cancerogenics, like ON.

Im going to sleep, to mull over the article.

 

[S.A.M.]

I like you, you read pub med.

While the role of anti-oxidants is important in countering damage done to cells already prone to mutation, the "risk" of mutation itself is cause by other factors, such as genetics and exposure to cancerogenics, like ON.

Im going to sleep, to mull over the article.

See edit.

 

[Fraggle Rocker]

An alternative should be found which stops scientific research being abandoned in favour of profit. I agree that the corporation allowed the boom, but it's different from the corruption seen in the market today.

Research is very expensive, the payoff is distant, and every project has a very high risk of delivering nothing useful. In other words, it's capital-intensive. This is the very sort of endeavor for which corporations are needed, perhaps even in the post-industrial era.

The only viable alternative to corporate research is government research. Governments are as corrupt and more inefficient than corporations, and (at least in the USA) they tend to attract people who can't get real jobs. That would be a change for the worse. We have to wait for some new kind of entity to evolve in the post-industrial world, to take over from the corporation. (And if we're lucky, also from government. )

 

[Odin'Izm]

In that case we need a new world-wide watchdog, which prohibits ineffective drugs and such from being allowed. Maybe one which also controls piracy, so companies can't add vitanic C to aspirin and call it a new substance.

 

[Fraggle Rocker]

In that case we need a new world-wide watchdog, which prohibits ineffective drugs and such from being allowed. Maybe one which also controls piracy, so companies can't add vitamin C to aspirin and call it a new substance.

We need an educated populace, "the cornerstone of democracy." It's a losing battle to protect people from their own foolishness. With the current fashion in America of knowing absolutely no science and giving respect and votes to people who don't "believe" in it, it's unlikely that any agency formed as the end result of a democratic consensus is going to solve the problem. We need to do something about the miserable educational system.

 

[TruthSeeker]

Research is very expensive, the payoff is distant, and every project has a very high risk of delivering nothing useful. In other words, it's capital-intensive. This is the very sort of endeavor for which corporations are needed, perhaps even in the post-industrial era.

The only viable alternative to corporate research is government research. Governments are as corrupt and more inefficient than corporations, and (at least in the USA) they tend to attract people who can't get real jobs. That would be a change for the worse. We have to wait for some new kind of entity to evolve in the post-industrial world, to take over from the corporation. (And if we're lucky, also from government. )

Huuuuuuuuuummmm......

*runs to the drawing board*



That's what I realized two years ago....

 

[TruthSeeker]

Frm sam's http://journals.cambridge.org/action...ine&aid=813824:

Se is an unusual trace element in having its own codon in mRNA that specifies its insertion into selenoproteins as selenocysteine (SeCys), by means of a mechanism requiring a large SeCys-insertion complex. This exacting insertion machinery for selenoprotein production has implications for the Se requirements for cancer prevention. If Se may protect against cancer, an adequate intake of Se is desirable. However, the level of intake in Europe and some parts of the world is not adequate for full expression of protective selenoproteins. The evidence for Se as a cancer preventive agent includes that from geographic, animal, prospective and intervention studies. Newly-published prospective studies on oesophageal, gastric-cardia and lung cancer have reinforced previous evidence, which is particularly strong for prostate cancer.

Se also helps regulate hormonal imbalances. Really good for women with endometriosis...

 

[guthrie]

The only viable alternative to corporate research is government research.

Yup. It's worked pretty well here in the UK. Still does, although much of the energy in the system has been captured by corporations.

The key point as usual is getting the energy to someone who is qualified and capable of using it most effectively. However you have to make decisions on this based upon limited information, and the most obvious path in science is not always the most effective.

Governments are as corrupt and more inefficient than corporations,

Not always. The biggest problem right now is that corporations and gvts have or are merged in ways which Rockefeller barely dreamt of. It also depends what sort of efficiency you are after. Gvt work often ends up dealing with human "efficiences", whereas corporations can chase after production efficiencies and ignore the societal side of things.

and (at least in the USA) they tend to attract people who can't get real jobs. That would be a change for the worse. We have to wait for some new kind of entity to evolve in the post-industrial world, to take over from the corporation. (And if we're lucky, also from government. )

Here in the UK everything attracts people who can't get real jobs. Corporations are full of such people. Many are accountants...

As for a new entity, I'm sure that some rather interesting structures will evolve, but I hold no hope at all of them being able to take over from corporations and do R and D better.
Unless of course we have my ideal comunist revolution....